Intel Goes Green with Lead-Free Microprocessors

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Intel intends to make its entire line of 45nm microprocessors a bit greener and said it will be manufacturing 100 percent lead-free chips when production ramps up in the second half of the year.

Specifically, the company announced on Tuesday that it will be doing away with the (partially) lead-based “packages” and “bumps” it uses to attach chips to motherboards and will instead use a newly devised tin, silver, and copper alloy.

This change will go into effect starting with Intel’s 45nm high-k metal gate processorsincluding the next generation of Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad, and Xeon chips, the company said.

Lead is typically used in a variety of electronics, primarily because of it advantageous electrical and mechanical properties. The different types of packages that envelope chips, and are subsequently used to connect them to the boards, have traditionally been partially composed of lead. That will no longer be the case later this year, Intel said.

Intel also said that starting in 2008 it will make all of its 65nm chipsets lead-free, too. The company maintains that there will be no performance or reliability impact to the new lead-free processors.

“Intel is taking an aggressive stance toward environmental sustainability, from the elimination of lead and a focus on greater energy efficiency of our products to fewer air emissions and more water and materials recycling,” said Nasser Grayeli, Intel vice president and director of assembly test technology development, in a statement Tuesday.

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